Once you begin to read the Old Testament with the New Testament in mind (and vice versa) you start to see the amazing ways that these two parts of the Bible connect to each other. One way to interpret our first reading, “The Call of Isaiah,” is as a powerful prefigurement of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Isaiah sees the Lord on His throne surrounded by a choir of angels singing, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts! All the earth is filled with his glory!” (Isaiah 6:3). We sing the same ancient chant just before the consecration of the Eucharist when Jesus enters the sanctuary in the Flesh. Jesus takes His throne as He is held high in the priest’s hands.
As Isaiah sees this holy scene, his conscience convicts him of his sinfulness and unworthiness to be in the presence of the Lord. He cries out, “Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5). Isaiah thinks he is going to die; after all, no man can see the face of God and live (cf. Exodus 33:20). We echo this when we say, “Lord, I am not worthy for you to enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed” (Matthew 8:8). Miraculously, we may look upon Jesus in the Eucharist and kneel before the Real Presence of the Lamb King.
An angel delivers an ember from the altar to burn away the impurities from Isaiah’s lips. The Church Fathers saw this burning coal that takes away sin as a prefigurement of the Most Holy Eucharist. St. Cyril wrote, “One of the seraphim is sent to Isaiah with a burning coal which he took from the altar with tongs. This is clearly a symbol of Christ, who, on our behalf, offered himself up to God the Father as a pure and unblemished spiritual sacrifice with a most pleasing fragrance. In the same way, Christ is received from the altar. We must, however, explain why Christ is like a burning coal. It is customary in Holy Scripture for the divine nature to be likened to fire. God appeared in this way to the people of Israel as they stood before the Lord at Horeb, which is Mount Sinai.”
“Wherefore, in all fear and with a pure conscience and undoubting faith let us approach .. . let us receive the body of the Crucified One. With eyes, lips, and faces turned toward it, let us receive the divine burning coal, so that the fire of the coal may be added to the desire within us to consume our sins and enlighten our hearts, and so that by this communion of the divine fire we may be set afire and deified.”
St. John of Damascus
When we receive the Blessed Sacrament–Christ’s Sacred Heart on fire with love for us–we are cleansed from all venial sin. Jesus’s Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity purifies us from within.
Once he is purified, Isaiah is sent to proclaim God’s Word to the people. He responds, “Here I am…send me!” (Isaiah 6:8). After we have been cleansed by being washed by the Word (Ephesians 5:26) and fed with finest wheat (Psalm 81:17), we too are sent: “Go, and announce the Gospel of the Lord.”
Jesus, may Isaiah’s response to You be my own. Here I am Lord. Send me as a gift to the world as a sign of Your goodness, truth, and love.